That article. Wow. I just.

I'm with Jesse.

I went Outside in the Snow. Now I can say I didn't stay inside the whole time. I had to shovel off the front porch just to get the gate open. Never had to do that before. I was planning on taking the trash bin down to the street and refilling the bird feeder. When I got snow in my socks despite wearing snow boots because the snow is up to my knees, I changed my plan to Scatter some bird seed on the snow and forget the trash. The trash can sit frozen on the porch, politely out of sight, until the snow melts enough I can get it to the bin. Damned if I'm straining my back to get one bag of trash to the street.

While I was wrestling with that, a man and his young son were trying to free their car from the ditch on the other side of my property. His friend came by in a cab to help. (I'm pretty sure these were the two men I heard last night shouting to each other about their car, who probably also made the footprints in the snow around my pine trees where they didn't need to be.) The boy came over and asked if I had a shovel. I handed him the snow shovel across the holly bushes - couldn't get out to take it to him - and asked if this had happened before. "This is the third time," he said with resignation. They dug the car out and he brought the shovel back. I wished him luck. Him, specifically. He's gonna need it.

Was shoveling at work and met a mom and her son coming in off the street with sleds. After exchanging pleasantries I told them I had bad news and good news: the bad being that sledding wasn't allowed, the good that I wouldn't stop them unless my ED spotted them and told me to. The snows deep enough not to harm the plants, and we really do have an awesome hill. Then bossman came back and was looking out the window and was all "what is that?!" And I thought he'd seen the sled tracks. But it was just footprints that he thought were deer tracks. Lying about not having seen the sled fees put off until another day!

And many roots and the remnants of a plastic netting bag have been removed from my sewer. The water flows. My plan to move gains more reinforcement.

So apparently my mom needs to know her moms death date for some kind of documentation she needs. And she doesn't remember. So she asked me because I have some genealogy stuff. I had one person on ancestry but it was the wrong one because the date was all off. Finally found a different reference that seemed more right....and was able to double-check it against an old livejournal entry. How weird. (It was 2006. Mom wasn't even sure of the year, but eventually thought it out and decided fall 2006, because she retired in 2007...so that was where I looked)

Livejournal is excellent for that. I suppose Facebook would work, these days, although I don't know how to search that so well.

Good for you, -t, I hope you enjoy it!

FYI, the Social Security Death Index is online and public. If there's a death certificate and you know basic information, you can find it. I verified my grandparents' death date that way.

Elle Fanning. Kate Hudson. Several Natalie Portmans. A man in a blazer scanned his phone, stumped. “You know, in ‘Sex & the City 2’? When they’re in Dubai? That butler?” asked Siddhartha Banthiya, an investment banker.

This was a part I found surprisingly on point, though. Of course this guy has to choose a speechless walk on part because he's INDIAN (I assume) because, Hollywood.

But that wasn't the point, right?

These trend pieces are just trolling the rest of humanity, right?

That was rough. Luckily, that guy can console himself with money.